Hinch’s Senate Diary: what the child abuse royal commission got wrong

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The soon-to-be-concluded Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is one of the most important inquiries this country has ever witnessed. Or, I hope, will ever witness.

What triggered it is a ghastly stain of cover-up on our churches and charities. But it remains, in my view, a jewel in Julia Gillard’s troubled time in office.

Two points. I am fearful that, like so many past inquiries, any recommendations could be lost or buried, especially over a vital national redress scheme.

Independent journalism is an essential service.

That is why I have lobbied for a joint parliamentary committee to be a watchdog, to make sure that whatever Justice Peter McClellan decrees is implemented.

It is why I have personal pledges from Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Opposition Leader Bill Shorten to support such a committee, which they have agreed I shall chair, and I will be introducing the matter at the next sitting of Parliament in May.

But, having heaped that praise on the commission, I have also written to Justice McClellan requesting that he reopen his public hearings and correct what I believe is a serious flaw in those hearings. We have seen interrogations of Catholics, Anglicans, the Salvation Army, Hillsong. What about Islamic schools and Muslim institutions?

A child bride is child rape. The mutilation of a girl’s vagina is a sexual violation.

I’ll pass on his response.

***

Going back to that issue of female genital mutilation. More than 30 years ago, I went to Africa to report on women being ostracised in their villages because they suffered from fistulas (Google it) and were victims of female genital mutilation.

I’m going to be crude here to explain why FGM is so putrid, so violent, so cruel, as it is performed on innocent children.

Let me point something out: men were originally circumcised to prevent health problems. Girls are brutally circumcised to prevent later adult pleasure.

When young girls are circumcised in Africa, this is what happens: A child is held down, usually by her mother. A crone with a knife hacks off her clitoris. The child then has cow dung smeared on the wound to cause infection and form a scab. And her legs are tied together while that happens.

That’s the stark truth. The practice still goes on in Australia. As well as the Islamic and Hindu tradition of little girls being offered up as child brides.

FGM is illegal in Australia. So is raping a young girl as a “bride”. Parents should be prosecuted. So should the person who performs the ceremony.

That’s why I say the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has, sadly, dropped the ball by not investigating Islamic institutions. That’s why I wrote to Justice McClellan.

***

It was good to see this week’s Turnbull-Dutton crackdown announcement on 457s even though we had predictably snide remarks about goat herders. It puzzled me how Bill Shorten had brazenly been making hay out of the issue when his confetti-like issuance of 457s while in office had led to McDonald’s and KFC exploiting the system.

It shouldn’t have surprised me. Nick Xenaphon and I were savaged by the CFMEU and union Twitter trolls for “giving Aussie jobs to 457 visas” when, in fact, last year we had forced Building Code and Australian Building and Construction Commission amendments that made it compulsory for Australian bosses to show cause and advertise nationally before a 457 could kick in.

I did succumb though and tweet:

***

The budget speculation is in full swing, and government ministers, as well as backbenchers, are running things up the flagpole to see who salutes. Super for first-home buyers. Pension breaks for downsizing seniors. First bad, second good.

It took me back to my childhood days of the walnut-veneer radiogram. We’d hear the Hit Parade Top Ten only once a week on a Sunday night after the Sunday morning “hospital request session” where people who were dying would hear You Will Never Grow Oold. Every week. And many of them wouldn’t grow much older. Which wasn’t the intended message.

What’s the budget connection? On that same radiogram, my Dad would play his favourite LP (as we called them). Billy Russell’s On Behalf of the Working Classes.

The best line, and I remember it well: “Promise them everything, give them nothing, and before you get it they take it off you.”

Sound familiar?

This crisis will cut hard and deep but one day it will be over.

What will be left? What do you want to be left?

I know what I want to see: I want to see a thriving, independent and robust Australian-owned news media. I want to see governments, authorities and those with power held to account. I want to see the media held to account too.

Demand for what we do is running high. Thank you. You can help us even more by encouraging others to subscribe — or by subscribing yourself if you haven’t already done so.

Jimbo

I agree with Derryn Hinch that the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse should investigate Islam, however, who would come forward? To complain would amount to apostasy which is punishable by death.

CML

Rais

The Royal Commission may have decided as it did because it knew that no Muslim school, institution or organisation in Australia supports the practices he names. Some individuals do but no organisations. Always good to see where a pollie is really coming from though, we know better where to put our votes next time.

John Ryan

Why do we have to put up with this hypocrite this clown who sits in the Senate when according to him he never voted,if you don’t vote you get no say.
Instead we have this clown giving us opinions on things he knows SFA about go back to being a Slock Jock Hinch & take the ignorant Hanson with you your both a waste of space

Ben.

He’s arrived as a Senator – first flip flopping from stated views to chase the polls, now seeking to swap votes in exchange for putting him in charge of his own parliamentary committee, with a bit of Mussie bashing thrown in.

Is ther evidence that FGM and child brides are widespread and institutionalised and protected as the rape was at churches, Synagogues, boarding schools and orphanages? Is it also protected by the state as many of the acts that took place at the aforementioned were?
If so then the Royal Commission should look into it, if not then this makes as much sense as forcing security agencies to follow where the money from Halal Certification goes.

Also, I’m not sure anyone involved with the commission is crying out for Dezza to ride in at the last second and try to become the hero of the day. The victims have been empowered and public support is widespread – why would a government try and screw them over at the last second, and what difference is an extra committee going to make?

Ah well, at least The Saturday Paper is willinging to treat him like a joke. Hopefully Crikey is shocked that what started as a column by an outsider going inside has morphed into this sad list of justifications and self promotion.

N.A.F.

So… Hinch went to “Africa”, and found that dung was being spread of vaginas. Therefore, Royal Commission.

Er… what? FGM is a blight in some parts of “Africa”, and deserves a more intelligent comment than this. But what does that have to do with an AUSTRALIAN Royal Commission into INSTITUTIONAL responses to child sex abuse? As other commenters have pointed out, this is utterly non-sequitur. And right on cue some twit comments that we “need to look at Islam”. (Pauline, was that you? Or was it James Ashby?)

Editors: if I wanted to toture myself by reading a series of content-free non-sequiturs thinly disguising a racist and Islamiphobic message I could do that without paying a subscription to Crikey. This is sub standard. Lose him before you lose readers.

MAC TEZ

Yes please Crikey, enough Hinch.
I’ve complained about this before and I know I’m not alone in my frustration. Once was more than enough,now listen to your readers , the subscribers who keep this thing alive… No More Hinch .

Ben.

The question is – does Crikey pay Hinch for this dung spread?
When Mayne used to have columns spruiking his amazing acts as a local councillor there was a disclaimer stating that he didn’t get paid. That’s never appeared after one of Dezza’s brag sheets. Shame.

MAC TEZ

lykurgus

Because every judge in every court (the ones he keeps blatantly ignoring, remember?) relies on the input of the Kiwi Trump who thinks he’s still in tabloid TV, still thinks the Shame File wasn’t eponymous (Google it, Senator), and still doesn’t understand that Africa isn’t one country (or can’t count to 50 – pick one).
Can’t imagine why they wouldn’t eagerly lap up his magnanimous offer to make their recommendations for them.

Jimbo

Wow. Reading the comments one can conclude the Muslim Defence League swung into gear or there is huge support for the practice of Female Genital Mutilation. There are over 20,000 instances of FGM known in the UK. It is known to occur here too. Who would dare complain?